Re: Rafa's One Man Band - Impact of looping -

Great points! I agree wholeheartedly. When i first began the One Man Band setup, about a year and a half ago I was really in a transition wondering if I was leaning more towards being more #1 or #2(from your descriptions), and I decided to go for 3. Sometimes I'll play an entire set with seamless transitions of pretty much pure instrumental improv, other times I'll do what I did in the video and put together a "normal" song arrangement. I think we are finally getting to a stage where one guy, with many loops can really be as enthralling as a full band. I also enjoy challenging the analog/digital debate, making folks question what is a genuine instrument and what's merely a soft instrument(when listening), as well as make guitar players realize you don't need to be playing through a Physical amp, or even 1000's of dollars worth of pedals. Just 1000's of dollars worth of laptop/midi gear ;-) Ha! My Ableton Live stup is made for performance ease, and for flexibility. I already added an Akai LPD8 for more pads and knobs, soon I'll add even more pads, and another small 25 key keyboard, and an FCB1010. Then I'll be set...I think...

I'm just trying to add into what I believe is a dialogue on what music is, and how looping can change/impact that.

Just some thoughts:-

Whenever a new technology is introduced to the musical world there are 2 responses.
1) Use it for an existing musical style, but with less effort.
2) Use it to create music that was impossible before.

Add to this that people taking up music often have to go through
an imitative phase first before they start to think about
finding their own voice, and most don't have a motivation to do so.
The great advantage of music that is imitative is that the audience
for it already exists.

So looping has a big impact in terms of allowing people
to perform, and a small impact in terms of musical innovation.

One of the things about looping technology is that it has
a great impact on musical form. Non-looping musos and composers don't have a restriction on arrangement, there's no need
to create layers individually. Work with live loops and
straight away the problem is how to keep the arrangement
interesting for the listener.

If you wanted to put loopers into categories, then how about:
1) One man band. Layers of different instruments usually ending
up as a song.
2) Ambient (mostly guitarist), feeding sounds into seemless loops.
3) Other, not content with being 1) or 2)

of those categories, 1 seems to have a foundation in imitation,
2 was new in the 70's, but is now largely imitative and
3 is growing over the last decade or so.